The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventor, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Ink-based printing devices sometimes use ink depletion methods to avoid problems with adjacent pigments bleeding into one another. These methods can be made more effective by taking into account the characteristics of the type of media (referred to herein as “media type”) upon which the ink is deposited. For example, an ink depletion method typically used for a rough media type (e.g., “plain” paper) can be more vigorous than that used for a smoother media type (e.g., fine “photo” paper).
The ink depletion methods may be implemented by processing a source image before the source image is sent to a printer. For example, a print driver of a personal computer may process a source image to create a printer-ready image or print job that is subsequently sent to a printer. Conventional image processing techniques are typically based on a specification of media type made by the user. However, a media type specified by a user may not always match a media type that is actually available to a printer.
Some printers are capable of detecting media types. In situations where the user has incorrectly specified the media type, the printer may be able to detect the problem and return a notification to the printer driver. The printer driver can respond by repeating its processing, this time based on the media type specified by the printer. However, this causes additional communication overhead between the printer and the printer driver, and also causes delays as the printer waits for the additional processing to be performed.
One way to address this problem is for the printer driver to query the printer before performing media-specific processing. However, the printer itself may not be able to detect the current media type until a print job is actually initiated. For example, the media type may not be detectable until the printer feeds the first sheet of paper. Furthermore, the media type may change part way through a print job, such as when one sheet of paper is followed by a sheet of a different media type.
The problem can also be addressed by performing any media-specific processing at a point in the job flow after the media type has been detected and/or is known. However, this is often impractical because the media-specific processing may require more resources than are available at that point.